Penang -- Week 6 -- Adventures in Taxicabbing

THURSDAY, April 24th
So today I have a play group to attend. Wahooo! I'm settling in! And I am finally introducing Regin to some other kids! George wakes me up before he leaves for work, and I think I have ages to get ready, so I lounge and enjoy the morning. Crap. It's already 8:30, I haven't showered, and I am supposed to be there between 9:30 and 10! I rush like crazy to get ready and then when I'm almost done, I call a cab (can look them up on yellowpages.com.my don't you know). I call the first company -- Sunshine something.

"Where coming from?"
"Jalan Birch"
"Birch? Birch Street, ah?"
"Yes. Jalan Birch"
"What apartment?"
"Aswan condo."
"Where?"
"It's in the Gurney area."
"Gurney-ah?"
"Yes"
"Birch Street-ah?"
"Yes"
"Building number?"
"I'm not sure, would you like my address?"
--indistinguishable mumbling back and forth with other people--
"Address?"
"It's 8-L4-3A Jalan Birch, Penang."
"Building number 8-ah?"
"Yes, I think so."
"Where going?"...

So it continues.

It takes me at least 10 minutes to finish this exchange, all the while I'm running between my laptop (for address info) and the bathroom mirror to put on mascara.

Then, after all of this, the guy says, "Sorry Miss, no one in your area, call back 10 minute."
"Can you just have someone come in half an hour?"
"Sorry miss, no one in your area right now, call back 10 minute."
"Well I just spent 10 minutes on the phone with you now. I'm late, I can't spend another 10 minutes with you when I call you again. Can't you just have someone come in half an hour?"
"Sorry Miss"
"Thank you."

I finish getting ready, and leave more than 10 minutes for a better answer this time.
"Sorry Miss, no one in your area, you call back."
"I already called back. When can you have someone in my area?"
"Sorry Miss, can't guarantee, you call back."
"I'm going to be late for my appointment now. Is there another company you can recommend?"
-chuckling- "No Miss, sorry, you call back."

I don't call back. I start looking for other companies. I find two more. I call the first one. "Where coming from?" "Jalan Birch." And so on... After gaining this information, there is a clicking sound and the line goes quiet. Did he just hang up on me? In my highest pitch possible I screech, "ARE YOU FREAKIN KIDDING ME???" But as I hang up, I realize the guy has actually walked away from the phone to check and see who is in my area and just didn't tell me. And instead of him hanging up on me, I hung up on him! But now I'm too embarrassed to call back in case he heard me screeching, so I call company number three. This guy's English is very broken at best, but thankfully the exchange is short and sweet. He'll send someone in 5 minutes and he gives me the cab number, which I promptly forget.

A few minutes later, my phone rings. "You call taxi Miss?"
"I already have one coming, thank you."
"I'm here Miss."
"Oh you're the taxi?"
"Yes Miss."
"You're here?"
"I'm at number 8 Jalan Birch. No Aswan Condo Miss."
"Are you near Gurney?"
"I'm on Jalan Birch."
"In the Gurney area?"
"Yes Miss. But no Aswan Condo."
"Did you see the Shell station?"
"Yes Miss. Already pass Shell station."
"Ok, well, if you're heading toward Gurney on Birch, we're on the right hand side, a white build..."
"I'm there already Miss, I'm here, number 8, no Aswan. Only Birch Court."
"Birch Court is opposite us. So if you are heading to Gurney on Bir..."
"Already at Gurney Miss."
"Yes, and if you are coming past the Shell station and going..."
"At Shell station Miss. No Aswan."
"I'm trying to tell you how to find Aswan!!!!"
-line goes dead-

I think he hung up but I'm desperate, I call back.
"Sorry Miss, battery."
"Can you go the Shell station?"
"Shell station? Yes Miss."
"I will meet you there, but it will take me about 5 or 10 minutes to get there."
"Ok Miss, I wait."

I gather everything together to leave; I have Regin in my right arm and my overstuffed purse (diapers for him, food for both of us, and a camera to document his first play group) on my left shoulder. I grab the car seat with my left hand, and as I grab my keys with my right, my purse starts falling off my shoulder. The phone rings. "You call for a Taxi?"
"I already have a taxi, thank you."
"Already here Miss." (It's a different voice)
"You're here?"
"Yes Miss."
"At Aswan Condo?"
"Yes Miss, Aswan Condo, you come down now?"

I'm not sure what I'm going to do. Do I ditch this guy and say I already have someone waiting down the street? Do I ask him to drive me to the other guy? Do I say, forget the other guy, he couldn't even find me? I don't want to burn any bridges yet. Let's make sure this guy is really even here. "I'll be right there."

I hike up Regin, pull the purse back up over my shoulder and set the car seat down as I lock my door, unlock the gate, pick up the seat, put it down outside the gate, relock the gate, then press the button for the elevator. Phew. How am I going to make it down in less than 10 minutes let alone make it to Shell? Crap! I get out of the elevator and hobble with all of my stuff the 50+ feet to the guard/gate where a cab is waiting. By now, Regin is slipping out of my right arm and dangling towards the ground. Forget it. I'm going with this guy. I don't even know for sure which Shell station the other guy is at, and he couldn't even find me! And there is no way I'm walking all the way there at this point. I climb in, get Regin all buckled, and we head out. I do the right thing (or as close as I can get at this point) and call the other cabbie.

"I'm sorry, two taxis came, and I don't need your taxi anymore."
"Sorry Miss?"
"Two taxis were sent, and I'm taking the other one, you don't have to wait for me. I'm so sorry."
"Sorry. Never mind Miss. You call, I wait all this time, and you take another cab!"
"I'm very sorry, there were two..."
"Never mind Miss, don't call back!"
"Ok, thank you."

My cabbie asks me about what happened. I tell him that two taxis were sent, he asks if I called more than one taxi stand. I did and the other cabbie is very angry with me. He says, "yes," and proceeds to scold me for doing that. I try to explain what happened and how flustered I was and desperate for a guarantee of a cab, and he says I shouldn't have called the first company because they are so far away (how far can they be on a tiny island?) I of course have no way of knowing that. "Never mind," he says, "Here's my card. You call me next time, you don't have to worry." I thank him. I also ask him if it's possible for him to show up at a given time if I ask him in advance, he says he can. Good. I officially have a cabbie.

He asks, "Where going Miss?"
"Hillside. Jalan Bungah Pudak."
"Bungah Pudak-ah?"
I'm not sure I hear him correctly, so I repeat, "Yes, Jalan Bungah Pudak."
"Hillside?"
"Yes."
"Apartment?"
"Pearlview Condo"
"Pearlview-ah?"
"Yes."

I have done my research and know I should have him agree on a price before we set off (no metered taxis here), 15RM, $5-ish, so that's fine. Regin is happily finishing his breakfast, and chatting away. All good. I can relax. We drive through a neighborhood and my cabbie starts pointing out the street signs and tells me that Bungah means flower in Malay, and that the word after Bungah is the kind of flower. All the streets in this neighborhood have "Bungah" in them, but none are of the Pudak variety. There is also no Pearlview Condo in sight. He asks if this is the correct neighborhood. I tell him all I know: Hillside, Bungah Pudak, Pearlview Condo. He calls his peeps back at the taxi stand. Apparently he's gone to the wrong area.

We drive through Hillside. I know this area. Joo Lee took us here so I could buy peanuts at the 7-11 and Other Agilent Guy and Family met us for Indian food here. (I really should use his name, Eric. George and he are carpooling now and totally bonding over their experiences here.) As we pass the 7-11, my Cabbie says, "You see? Jalan Bungah Pudak," and points with his thumb the way many of the locals do. I don't see. Not sure where he was pointing. And is he correcting me as if I had been sending him to the wrong place? Never mind.

He drops me off, and I ask him to come back at 11:30.

YAYYYYYY! Play group. I carry all my crap to the door; the gate is open. I ring the doorbell. The cutest American blonde answers with a big smile. "Hi! Elisabeth?" She speaks with the most wonderfully familiar accent and facial expressions. She offers her hand to shake mine. I turn the corner and three more American accents greet me, with kids, babies, and an impossible number of toys sprawled around them. Brandi, our host, offers me food, (an egg dish, yay! I can eat that!) and asks me if I had any trouble making it. I tell my story. They are so sorry for my bad experience. "It's okay," I say, "I get to blog about it later."

After my story finishes, they ask me, "How did you find all these cab companies?" I tell them, "Oh! I just looked them up on Yellowpages.com.my."
"I didn't know you could do that, did you?"
"No! That's good to know!"
"I always wondered if there was some kind of phone book or directory for this place!"
Ha! I know something that they don't and I'm the newbie!!

I receive introductions. Brandi is a mother of 3 girls, the youngest is an infant, the oldest is... in school? The middle one is running around playing with a boy who's about 3. His mom, I forget her name, grew up in Indonesia and went to school in Penang, so she's a little more familiar with things. She tells me that it's all very different now though. They didn't have malls before and she wasn't an adult so she knew nothing of grocery stores and banking then. She also has another little one who is about 10 months old. Almost exactly Regin's size. Yay! Brandi says she's lived in some group of islands (forget which) for the last several years, but pretty much the whole island was an American base, so she didn't get much real cultural experience. Her husband loves it here and his mom lives here, but Brandi isn't sure she loves it enough to stay too much longer. She's been here since July.

Then there's Rachel. She's the mother of an infant boy who loves to smile. She and her husband are linguists and I swear I catch her signing "all done" to the little one after feeding him. She's got this breezy, at-peace-with-herself vibe and she seems totally relaxed with motherhood. I secretly wonder if she is always so calm and breezy or if she has meltdowns like me (and supposedly every other mother has). She and her husband are doing fascinating work with some local groups, and developing an alphabet with them. They are also going to help them make their own dictionary! Wow! I'm jealous. This is one of my dream careers (if not for film and art). She has stories about how the people in her village can't pronounce her name. Rachel is just too difficult, so they give her another name.

I enjoy myself thoroughly, but I notice a few Christian references here and there; I believe some of them are even doing missionary work. It's fine. It doesn't bother me. But I hope it doesn't prove to be overly Christian in tone down the road. Yeah, for those of you who don't know, I'm athiest, and... after 13.5 years in the States, I'm a little tired of my Christian-infused life there. I'm a little surprised to hear about missionary work though. I'm not even sure I've seen this many Christian churches in the States. Do they need missionaries here?

The group is really more of a support group for American expat wives than anything for the kids, but it's great. I'm not sure how much Regin gets out of it. He sits fairly still in a big pile of toys for a long while. He's interested in the 10-month-old only briefly. He does become a little obsessed with a hamster cage sitting on the floor at one point. But I'm able to distract him. It is nap time and boobs are a bigger draw right now. We spend most of the time talking about Penang and exchanging local tips. We don't even start mother talk till a little before the end of the group. It's about this time that I notice that Brandi is using the local method of cooling down her place: open windows and front door. I also notice that she has no shoes on, then again, no one does. No one except me and Regin. Ugh. So rude. I didn't remove my shoes when I entered!

On the ride home, it's pouring rain. We pass a car, decorated with flowers and a large photo of a woman. Behind it is a long line of people, all dressed in white, standing under umbrellas. I ask if it is a funeral. "Chinese funeral, yes."

That afternoon, I have possibly my worst hypoglycemic crash ever. I'm really worried. I've already gotten more serious about my diet. But it's not enough. I'm not doing something right, maybe I need to find a local endocrinologist. How do I do that?

You may have noticed, no photos for this story. Nope, camera never left my bag. Not for the cute, face-to-face time Regin shared with the other little boy, and not for the Chinese funeral. Sorry, this is a wordy story, not a visual one. You'll have to picture it all for yourself.